Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
Speaker 1: where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
Speaker 1: today's best minds, and Mitch McConnell says that Donald Trump's
Speaker 1: pardons were a mistake. Welcome to the resistance, Mitch McConnell.
Speaker 1: We have such a great show for you today. The
Speaker 1: nation's keyd here tries to make sense of Trump's plans
Speaker 1: to annex Canada and make him an American citizen. Then
Speaker 1: we'll talk to Democracy now Sky Perryman about the many, many,
Speaker 1: many lawsuits that her organization is filing against Trump's two
Speaker 1: point zero agenda.
Speaker 2: But first the news Somali.
Speaker 3: There is now the Elon Act.
Speaker 4: The other day I saw an Elon University sticker out
Speaker 4: a card.
Speaker 3: I thought, does it teach you? That's wheat badly that
Speaker 3: I remembered it was real.
Speaker 4: Now we have the Elon Act, which is going to
Speaker 4: put a border between government contracts and people working in government.
Speaker 3: What are you seeing here?
Speaker 1: This is something if Congress had ever been at all
Speaker 1: interested in legislating ever, this would have exit. This would
Speaker 1: have been passed twenty years ago. Right, this is why
Speaker 1: we have legislation, Right, this is why we do it.
Speaker 1: So basically, there's a Congressman from Wisconsin, Mark Pocan, who
Speaker 1: is going to roll out the eliminate looting of our
Speaker 1: nation by mitigating unethical state cryptocracy quote and then in
Speaker 1: brackets Elon Musk act.
Speaker 3: Can we just applaud him for that? Very well done.
Speaker 1: You know why he's doing this, eliminating looting in our
Speaker 1: nation by mitigating unethical state cryptocracy Elon Musk Act. The
Speaker 1: reason why he's doing this is because the chances of
Speaker 1: this passing are exactly zero. Right, Democrats don't control the House,
Speaker 1: they don't control the Senate, they don't control the presidency.
Speaker 1: That's the understatement of the year. So the point here,
Speaker 1: and I think it's actually smart, is just to have
Speaker 1: it out there. You know what Mark's doing here, he's hoping.
Speaker 1: You know, he knows that a lot of Republicans won't
Speaker 1: read the bill, but they might read the title.
Speaker 2: So that's very smart.
Speaker 1: And again, the idea there is no government employee special
Speaker 1: or not uses special in quotes should have any financial
Speaker 1: interest in the government period.
Speaker 2: Paragraph.
Speaker 1: Elon Musk is the poster child for this kind of
Speaker 1: potential abuse. I want to just point out there was
Speaker 1: a really smart tweet from my friend and yours, Steve Ratner,
Speaker 1: who goes on Morning Joe alone, is very smart. That
Speaker 1: must companies have received over fifteen billion dollars from the
Speaker 1: United States government. So between Tesla, which has an enormous
Speaker 1: amount of government contracts, actually Tesla only has three hundred thousand,
Speaker 1: but SpaceX has fifteen point four billion dollars in government contracts,
Speaker 1: and they work with NASA, the EPA, but most of
Speaker 1: that money comes from NASA, but they also work with
Speaker 1: the Defense Department. So when you realize that Elon Musk
Speaker 1: makes a ton of money from the federal government, this
Speaker 1: all makes a lot of sense. Why he should not
Speaker 1: be running it too. He should I'll be profiting and
Speaker 1: running the federal government. Look, this is why we have
Speaker 1: all of this legislation, you know, the sort of post
Speaker 1: Watergate legislation, which was to curb corruption. And so obviously
Speaker 1: we need more legislation. It won't can pass, but it's
Speaker 1: very good to see Democrats doing this. It's important and
Speaker 1: useful and also what this is. And by the way,
Speaker 1: it's important to keep remembering that Elon Musk is in
Speaker 1: the government's computers and he's got his tech bros who
Speaker 1: are in their twenties, and they're all in there messing
Speaker 1: around Smiley.
Speaker 4: After we get done taping yesterday, I walked up to
Speaker 4: talk to my lovely wife and I encountered a television
Speaker 4: with Donald Trump yapping next to Benjamin Yette Yahoo. And
Speaker 4: I wanted to believe I was watching AI generated madness,
Speaker 4: but in fact I was watching Trump suggest that the
Speaker 4: US take a for the Gaza strip.
Speaker 5: Look.
Speaker 1: Trump has mused about what good real estate gaza is.
Speaker 1: This is something we've seen him do before. It's what
Speaker 1: is it. It's Trump's usual sort of freelancing what he
Speaker 1: said yesterday. And again, remember it's Trump. So there's a
Speaker 1: lot of you know, there's a lot of flooding the
Speaker 1: zone shit, so nobody really knows what's happening here, And
Speaker 1: like I want to point out that it's possible he
Speaker 1: was just freelancing. In fact, there's a picture of Susie Wiles,
Speaker 1: his chief of staff, when he was saying it, and
Speaker 1: her eyes were bulging out of her head, which makes
Speaker 1: me think, you know, it was like when Trump. Remember
Speaker 1: when Trump said maybe if you bring the light into
Speaker 1: the body with COVID, you can kill COVID and then
Speaker 1: you saw you saw Deborah Burke, who was working in
Speaker 1: the ADMIN.
Speaker 2: Like her eyes bulging out of her head. That was
Speaker 2: what this is like.
Speaker 1: So anyway, we saw him talk about this to a
Speaker 1: whole musing about how maybe he would send in American troops.
Speaker 1: Nobody wants American troops in the Middle East. In fact,
Speaker 1: he was elected to make eggs cheaper. That's not happening,
Speaker 1: and also to end endless wars, also not happening. But
Speaker 1: he's not going to be able to send American or
Speaker 1: if he does, there's going to be a major constitutional crisis,
Speaker 1: which will be not surprising.
Speaker 4: Personally, Malli, what did it for me? Is newest member
Speaker 4: of the resistance, Rand Paul said that he didn't quite
Speaker 4: see this out this as an American first agenda.
Speaker 1: This is the most cursed timeline where Rand Paul and
Speaker 1: Mitch McConnell are being held up as voices of sanity.
Speaker 2: We are so incredibly.
Speaker 4: Fucked speaking of the CIA has offered buyouts to the
Speaker 4: entire workforce of the CIA.
Speaker 1: So I want to point out that having to defend
Speaker 1: the CIA is not as a lefty we don't want
Speaker 1: to defend the CIA in our minds nation building is bad. Okay,
Speaker 1: I don't want you know, like usaid, We've talked about
Speaker 1: this last week or last episode.
Speaker 2: Hey brings me no pleasure to defend the.
Speaker 1: FBI in the CIA, right, These are you know, organizations
Speaker 1: filled with Republicans, and yet I think firing the entire
Speaker 1: CIA might be a mistake. I'm just gonna go out
Speaker 1: on a limb here and say, some of those guys
Speaker 1: are doing pretty important stuff preventing terrorism. You know, look,
Speaker 1: I don't even want to say this because I don't
Speaker 1: want to jinx us, but there's a reason why we
Speaker 1: haven't had a wide, you know, an enormous terrorist attack
Speaker 1: since nine to eleven. It's because these people in the CIA,
Speaker 1: in the FBI have been keeping us safe. And I'm
Speaker 1: sorry to tell you I take no pleasure in any
Speaker 1: of this. But I don't think firing the entire CIA
Speaker 1: is a good call.
Speaker 6: And now I am.
Speaker 1: Done because I'm so depressed. But yes, don't fire the CIA.
Speaker 1: This is an insane thing to do. And you know
Speaker 1: what the other thing is that these buyouts are all
Speaker 1: just completely you know, they don't have the money for it.
Speaker 1: It's you know, it's elon. Just try to get people
Speaker 1: to quit so that he doesn't have to deal with them.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's pretty silly.
Speaker 4: So next we come to a Politico article that, well,
Speaker 4: we never like to do the I told you so thing,
Speaker 4: but we should really.
Speaker 5: Try to love that.
Speaker 4: I should try to mark the I told you so
Speaker 4: with a little bit of facts of thirty seven ways
Speaker 4: Project twenty twenty five has shown up in Trump's executive orders.
Speaker 2: What you got, Molly, There are a lot of ways.
Speaker 2: I know you're going to be shocked to hear that, just.
Speaker 4: As many people are often saying, there are many ways
Speaker 4: that this is showing up.
Speaker 1: Look, Project twenty twenty five is like social issues school choice,
Speaker 1: which is, you know, defunding public schools, allowing troops to
Speaker 1: rejoin who decline the COVID nineteen vaccine, banning transgender troops,
Speaker 1: closing the Office of Federal Contract Compliance programs, ending diversity
Speaker 1: in the equity and inclusion, ending government efforts to fight misinformation,
Speaker 1: enforce the death penalty, and execute prisoners on death row.
Speaker 2: What else, remove DEI from federal hiring. We are just
Speaker 2: in it in.
Speaker 1: A way that is completely insane and Okay, we're sending
Speaker 1: health care protections for sexual orientation and gender identity Right,
Speaker 1: which of course restrict federal funds from supporting abortion access
Speaker 1: abroad and under the Mexico City I mean, it's just
Speaker 1: everything you thought using Civil Rights Act to remove gender
Speaker 1: ideology and critical race theory, withdraw from the World Health Organization,
Speaker 1: you know, every plan that we thought, We just knew
Speaker 1: that this was going to be. This was how it
Speaker 1: was going to be. And it's just incredible. You know,
Speaker 1: when Trump said he wasn't going to do it, we
Speaker 1: should have just no one should have believed him. And
Speaker 1: here we are, and he's staffed a lot of project
Speaker 1: you know, worthy of So many people worked in Trump
Speaker 1: one point zero, went into the Heritage Foundation or the
Speaker 1: other groups that Row Project twenty twenty five and now
Speaker 1: are in Trump two point zero or are on the
Speaker 1: outside trying to control it. This is just completely, completely
Speaker 1: crazy and I'm not surprised at all, and none of
Speaker 1: us should be.
Speaker 2: And we saw this coming a mile away.
Speaker 1: Jeet here is a contributor to the nation and the
Speaker 1: host of the Time of Monsters.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to Fast Politics. Jeat Here.
Speaker 5: Always good to be on.
Speaker 2: I'm such a fan of yours.
Speaker 1: And you know, it's funny because it's like you have.
Speaker 7: Been coming on this podcast through the last four years
Speaker 7: of normal. But you know, we certainly have had our
Speaker 7: problems with Joe Biden, don't get me wrong, you know,
Speaker 7: and there was certain only some things where we were
Speaker 7: both i think quite agitated, like his foreign policy perhaps
Speaker 7: not reflecting my own.
Speaker 2: But wow, holy Molly.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no, we're crazy town. Now.
Speaker 2: There was shock, there was awe yesterday.
Speaker 1: There were so many things that happened, and some of
Speaker 1: them will have lasting implications, some of them will affect
Speaker 1: what our lives are like ten years from now, and
Speaker 1: some of them will just be a rounding error.
Speaker 2: So where do you want to start?
Speaker 5: Yeah, well, I mean, actually, I think that's a really
Speaker 5: crucial point that I think a lot of the sort
Speaker 5: of Trump strategy, which I think he gets from Bannon
Speaker 5: as well, is to just like, you know, creates so
Speaker 5: much chaos that it confuses the opposition. And I think
Speaker 5: that what has to like distinguish between things that are
Speaker 5: appalling but actually like don't match policy or don't have
Speaker 5: quite the policy consequences, whereas things that are actually bad
Speaker 5: in terms of like actual events that are happening in
Speaker 5: the world. Because you know, we know Trump is a
Speaker 5: BS artist, so I actually want to like just clarify
Speaker 5: that point because there's a lot of stuff that he said,
Speaker 5: you know, like yesterday one of the United States to
Speaker 5: take over Gaza, presumably after Palstinin's had been cleared out
Speaker 5: of there, and to make the so called riviera of
Speaker 5: the Middle East in Gaza. It's a great real estate
Speaker 5: opportunity folks get in.
Speaker 1: And by the way, I want to specify that we're
Speaker 1: laughing to keep from grime because this is so dystopian
Speaker 1: and dark.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, like just like on the face of it,
Speaker 5: you know, this is an American president who's calling for
Speaker 5: our a ethnic clergic be you know, kind of imperialism.
Speaker 2: Yes, and more American troops to the Middle East to.
Speaker 5: Get yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, like if it were to happen,
Speaker 5: so super appalling, even appalling if it doesn't happen, because
Speaker 5: this totally discredits the United States on the world stage
Speaker 5: in terms of all its claims and to support the
Speaker 5: international law. Now, having said that, I want to tie
Speaker 5: this in with the sort of terrifores going on because
Speaker 5: it's very interesting to see how Trump operates on this
Speaker 5: and I think it is a lot of this is
Speaker 5: what in professional wrestling is known as k fabe.
Speaker 2: Ooh, what's that?
Speaker 5: K fabe is like how you're watching something that is
Speaker 5: it's the tacit agreement between the audience and the wrestlers
Speaker 5: to pretend that everything is real even though they know
Speaker 5: it's not real.
Speaker 2: Oh, that's really interesting.
Speaker 5: It's a very useful term. And Trump himself the product
Speaker 5: of the world of professional wrestling. I mean, this is
Speaker 5: one of the reasons he's president. He's like built a
Speaker 5: celebrity in the WWE world, and he's made Vince pac
Speaker 5: Man's wife. She's the nominee to be at the Department
Speaker 5: of Education.
Speaker 2: She knows a lot about learning.
Speaker 5: That's the right. Yeah, but I mean he's a professional wrestler. Like,
Speaker 5: like one should no more take anything, Crump says seriously
Speaker 5: than one should take the feud between a Hulk hole
Speaker 5: Gan and Andre the Giant, right, Like, this is a
Speaker 5: lot of this is like performative now, especially on the
Speaker 5: trade wars. Like I want to underscore this because what
Speaker 5: Trump has done is a He's made huge claims of
Speaker 5: like you know, wanting to annex Canada, which I gotta
Speaker 5: tell you in Canada is not making people very happy here.
Speaker 5: Wanted to annex Greenland, wanted to take over the Panama
Speaker 5: Canal again, and then having the tariffs, launching a trade war,
Speaker 5: and then negotiating. And what's interesting is that what he's
Speaker 5: negotiating like is actually like basically the same or like
Speaker 5: less than what the US had. So like just the
Speaker 5: clearst cases in Mexico where you say, like, oh wow,
Speaker 5: Mexican President Claudia Shineban has agreed to send ten thousand
Speaker 5: Mexican troops to supporter Well guess what underbinded that fifteen
Speaker 5: thousand troops, So this is like five thousand less troops.
Speaker 5: And he also got Trump to say that the US
Speaker 5: will work on a major Mexican issue, which is the
Speaker 5: selling of like you know, high powered military weapons made
Speaker 5: in America to the Mexican cartels, which is something Mexico wants, right,
Speaker 5: Like you look at the negotiations, like, you know, Mexico,
Speaker 5: to my mind, came out on top of this. Now
Speaker 5: in Canada like the same thing, like like you know,
Speaker 5: he had trade war, threats of taking over were negotiated,
Speaker 5: and what basically just In Trudeau agree to was when
Speaker 5: you know, wrapping up spending on border, which he'd already
Speaker 5: agreed to under Biden, and the setting up a fentanyl zar,
Speaker 5: whatever the hell that means. And I gotta say, like, like,
Speaker 5: in twenty twenty three, do you know how much ventanyl
Speaker 5: came in was caught at the border between kind of
Speaker 5: the United States?
Speaker 2: How much ten pounds?
Speaker 5: Two pounds? What? And last year was like forty eight pounds,
Speaker 5: And like the Katie Van says is a massive amount
Speaker 5: of ventanyl, Well it's actually like less than your average
Speaker 5: like healthy dog.
Speaker 2: Ways exactly, even my dog's way more than.
Speaker 5: That, yeah, exactly. So I gotta say, like, so he's
Speaker 5: getting like basically nothing. You can go down the line
Speaker 5: with Panama, you know, like they agreed to break up
Speaker 5: greate agreements with China, which they had already agreed to
Speaker 5: break up like in twenty nineteen. So so again, he's
Speaker 5: getting nothing from these agreements, but he's getting a lot
Speaker 5: of theater. And I think that the theater is both
Speaker 5: the sort of like to please the mega base will
Speaker 5: like look on this to day all, look how strong
Speaker 5: Trump's winning on the international stage. He's like beating his chest,
Speaker 5: He's showing America's great again, while getting nothing and secondly,
Speaker 5: I don't know if it's a deliberate strategy for distraction,
Speaker 5: but it actually like takes people's focus away for the
Speaker 5: real stop. And I gotta say, like for the last week,
Speaker 5: you know, the real stop is Elon Musk taking control
Speaker 5: of the federal government of the actual like you know,
Speaker 5: going in there. This guy hey, like you know, hasn't
Speaker 5: been confirmed by the said or anything, is head of this.
Speaker 5: This is called DOGE, which is like, oh, only exists
Speaker 5: because of like an executive order by Trump. He's not
Speaker 5: a real agency. Is staffed by like you know, like
Speaker 5: basically teenagers cronies of Musk whose names he doesn't even
Speaker 5: want to reveal.
Speaker 1: Right because that's docs and even though they work for
Speaker 1: the federal government and he's stocked other federal government employees before.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and also like you know, like actually, if he
Speaker 5: wants us to have a government official that's like in
Speaker 5: charge of like the system that makes all your Social
Speaker 5: Security checks go out, you should actually know they're right,
Speaker 5: So they've taken over this. Economist Nathan Tankas has done
Speaker 5: a lot of really good writing really explaining this like
Speaker 5: a detail, but basically this is the beating heart of
Speaker 5: the federal government. You know, just as your heart pumps
Speaker 5: up blood, the financial system of finances picking out is
Speaker 5: what pumps out all the checks that you know, so
Speaker 5: you get your Social Security get check, you get your
Speaker 5: Medicare check, you get like everything. And now Elon Musk,
Speaker 5: a private citizen, happens to the world's richest man, happens
Speaker 5: to have a lot of government contracts, is able to
Speaker 5: look at like everyone's Social Security number, and every check
Speaker 5: that goes to the federal government sends out, and he
Speaker 5: can like look into the basically the contracts of all
Speaker 5: his rivals and has like this enormous power. And you know,
Speaker 5: they indititionally lied and said they're doing only read only,
Speaker 5: but actually it's been reported by Wired they're able to
Speaker 5: they're actually like changing the codes of this finance system.
Speaker 5: And that is an incredibly dangerous overreach. And it's basically
Speaker 5: a coup like Musk has committed like uh, successful coup
Speaker 5: at the highest levels of federal power. This is like
Speaker 5: a hugely worriesome thing. And I think it's actually I EI,
Speaker 5: the one thing that gives me heart is that I
Speaker 5: think this is something that's resonating. Individual did a zoom
Speaker 5: call which crash started twenty thousand and not a lot
Speaker 5: of people are going under protest, and like I think
Speaker 5: as fectless as I feel that Democrats have been, so
Speaker 5: she said, Trump's victory, this is actually like getting people
Speaker 5: like check Schumer out there protesting and been thinking about
Speaker 5: like becoming you know, like God forbid, a real opposition party.
Speaker 5: So I want people to be able to distinguish, you know,
Speaker 5: like it's gone like over loud territory and it's a
Speaker 5: bit roundabout, but distinguished between the things that are theatrical,
Speaker 5: that are basically you know, appalling on every level should
Speaker 5: be condemned, Like it's not actually good for the American
Speaker 5: president to talk about annexing other countries, you know, whether
Speaker 5: it's Canada, Greenland or Gaza. That's not good. That should
Speaker 5: be condemned straightforwardly. But it's not happening. What is actually
Speaker 5: happening where where I think that folk of protests and
Speaker 5: energy has to be Like I think that basically with
Speaker 5: the trade stuff, like I would and the gods of stuff,
Speaker 5: I wouldn't ignore it, but I would just like I
Speaker 5: think the best response is just like you know, you're
Speaker 5: just talking out of your hat.
Speaker 1: Well, and also I want to add, like, I think
Speaker 1: you're right, and I think.
Speaker 2: There are two things though that have to be remembered.
Speaker 1: One is that all of this is to extend tax
Speaker 1: cuts for very rich people. None of this is needed,
Speaker 1: None of this must happen. You can just reverse the
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen tax cuts and then we're all fine. Right,
Speaker 1: there's some debt, but it's not crazy. You can balance
Speaker 1: the budget without destroying the federal government. This is because
Speaker 1: it's ideologically aligned with Project twenty twenty five and the
Speaker 1: far rights desire to crosh the federal government.
Speaker 2: Sorry continue, Yeah, No.
Speaker 5: I absolutely, I actually think that. I mean, I think
Speaker 5: the Texest has made this point which I think has
Speaker 5: to be understood. The debt leverage is going to be
Speaker 5: combined with must takeover of the federal financial system. That's
Speaker 5: just say, like, once the debt ceiling stuff comes in,
Speaker 5: there's gonna be a lot of debate what gets well cut,
Speaker 5: what doesn't, And Musk is going to be able to
Speaker 5: basically docs and out and make a big show of
Speaker 5: various spending programs and give that. It's going to be
Speaker 5: a leverage that Trump uses for this long held project
Speaker 5: like radically scaling back social services in the United States.
Speaker 5: I mean the basic math is that, like, Okay, if
Speaker 5: military spending is off the table, and the Trump has
Speaker 5: said he wants worse money on the military, not last,
Speaker 5: then the only way you can get the kind of
Speaker 5: cuts that you need to finance these tax cuts is
Speaker 5: you have to go after Medicare and Social Security. I mean,
Speaker 5: those are like just they're just the biggest items on
Speaker 5: the thing, and like everything else, all this USA USAID
Speaker 5: stuff like that's just small peanuts.
Speaker 1: Gee, just for one second, since you and I both
Speaker 1: come from these very lefty I mean, I assume your
Speaker 1: parents were big lefties, but my Grandpather was this communist,
Speaker 1: Like didn't you always just assume USA was like a
Speaker 1: cover for the CIA.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, I know, it's totally a cover of the CI.
Speaker 5: Yeah yeah, yeah, no, it totally is. Which is also
Speaker 5: kind of interesting. I mean there is I mean most
Speaker 5: I think, you know, he has a lot of business
Speaker 5: highs all over the world, and he's playing a lot
Speaker 5: of deep games, and I think, you know, like what
Speaker 5: cadrule loud that like he's like you're gonna be able
Speaker 5: to plotate various foreign people who want USAID to be cut.
Speaker 5: But I have to say it, like I think, on
Speaker 5: the principle of it, I think, yes, a private billionaire
Speaker 5: should not be allowed to cut a government agency just
Speaker 5: by his whim. Like that's like crazy and it's unconstitutional
Speaker 5: and it's a coup and Democrats should oppose.
Speaker 3: It on that end.
Speaker 5: Uh, you know, like whether and USAID does good stuff,
Speaker 5: I'll grant you that, But you know, having said that,
Speaker 5: like as you think a lot of the Democratic Party
Speaker 5: decision to focus on USAID is the same old playbook.
Speaker 5: You know, let's rally the national security state. Let's get
Speaker 5: the good Republicans on board because they know the importance
Speaker 5: of the stuff to and will create a bipartisan consensus
Speaker 5: against Trump. I say, like that script is the work,
Speaker 5: and it's a Dick Cheney strategy, Like let's talk Dick Cheney,
Speaker 5: and it has especially like we now know it doesn't
Speaker 5: work because you're seeing all these Republicans going on and
Speaker 5: supporting Tulta Gabbard right, like they tried the same thing.
Speaker 5: Gabbard quite correctly pointing out but you know, she has
Speaker 5: stuff that's totally outside the consensus of mas form policy.
Speaker 5: But guess what Tom Cousin is a is a backup Republican,
Speaker 5: he's gonna vote for her.
Speaker 1: I want to do two seconds more on what you
Speaker 1: just said, because I think that's really important. There has
Speaker 1: been a branch of the Democratic Party that has truly
Speaker 1: believed that if you just appeal to saint Republicans, they
Speaker 1: will switch parties. So we have seen that that not
Speaker 1: only does that not happen, they just leave. So the
Speaker 1: very very few sane Republicans Jeff Flake, Ben sass gone right,
Speaker 1: that's it.
Speaker 2: Everyone else turned maga.
Speaker 1: Even the smart sort of doctors in the Senate, and
Speaker 1: I'm thinking about you, Bill Cassidy, smart moral voted for
Speaker 1: RFK Junior. So there is no normal Republican party anymore.
Speaker 1: And the fact that Democrats keep thinking that they can
Speaker 1: appeal to those people, and I think in some ways,
Speaker 1: you know, Harris's campaign made this play for these educated Republican.
Speaker 2: Women, Well they didn't care. So obviously those people no
Speaker 2: longer exist.
Speaker 1: So Democrats should just appeal to their base as opposed
Speaker 1: to ignoring their base.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I know, absolutely, And I just want to underscore
Speaker 5: one they it's not just that they didn't win over
Speaker 5: the educated Republicans, but to the extent that the Democrats
Speaker 5: become the pro establishment party, because when you do that,
Speaker 5: what you're saying is we are the party of the
Speaker 5: mainstream establishment. The you know, old line Republicans and old
Speaker 5: line Democrats were united against Trump. That actually alienates people,
Speaker 5: That alienates your own base because right now America is
Speaker 5: in an anti system mood. It has been for like
Speaker 5: just like two thousand and eight with the financial meltdown.
Speaker 5: And in an anti system mood, you don't want to
Speaker 5: support the parole system party like that's your enemy. And
Speaker 5: people it's not so much people go over to cramp.
Speaker 5: They just stay home.
Speaker 2: And that's what we saw.
Speaker 5: We saw. It's absolutely happened. Some of us said it
Speaker 5: is gonna happen, and you know, like I hate to
Speaker 5: say I told you so, but actually I like to
Speaker 5: say I told you so.
Speaker 1: We are again not laughing for any reason other than
Speaker 1: the world is burning down.
Speaker 2: Actually the world is not bringing down just America.
Speaker 5: But yes, yeah, yeah, no, no, no, no, I think I
Speaker 5: think America is big enough that it can't actually take
Speaker 5: down the world. Then I'd be like, don't understimate yourself.
Speaker 5: Don't under I mean, like as a Canadian nationalist. Now
Speaker 5: and there's a lot of Canadian nationalism, Like I sure
Speaker 5: we have these fantasies like let's burn down the White
Speaker 5: House again as you did in eighteen twelve, but really, honestly,
Speaker 5: like you know, like we're all in this together. And
Speaker 5: now having said that, so I think that like with
Speaker 5: must takeover, like please don't talk about you say, I
Speaker 5: D like, don't talk about how these poor like guys
Speaker 5: in Langley, Virginia are gonna be out of a job, like,
Speaker 5: so talk about the you know, like like actually Medicare
Speaker 5: and social Security.
Speaker 2: This is like, this is what they're targeting.
Speaker 5: This is gonna be like uh uh. And that the
Speaker 5: world richest man who wants to become even richer because
Speaker 5: he has fantasies of setting up a utopia on Mars,
Speaker 5: you know, is gonna gut the federal government and it's
Speaker 5: been given like extraordinary unconstitutional power that people should be
Speaker 5: out on the street for that, and that this is
Speaker 5: gonna actually hurt like real people in the real world.
Speaker 5: So I think it's very important not just to oppose it,
Speaker 5: but to oppose it the right way. And I got
Speaker 5: to say, like some of this focus on USAI D
Speaker 5: like to me, like it's the Cheney mindset.
Speaker 1: No, And I think that's a really good point that
Speaker 1: it's Liz Cheney mindset. Liz Cheney is not I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't know her, but she did the right thing.
Speaker 1: But she has no constituency and so it's not a
Speaker 1: moral tradgment. It's a you need electeds who have people
Speaker 1: who vote them, and if you don't have that, then
Speaker 1: there it's kind of silly. I want to just for
Speaker 1: a minute talk about it's funny because I'm thinking about
Speaker 1: like the best thing that ever happened to Trudeau this.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, I know the hob Trudeau will still be
Speaker 5: kind kind of but he's gonna go out of go
Speaker 5: out on a high note. And I actually think, I mean,
Speaker 5: it's very I don't know if your listeners a you say,
Speaker 5: Canadian are pulling, but the Liberal Party like just a
Speaker 5: butt ago was headed towards a blood bath, like they
Speaker 5: were headed towards like an extinction level I've had because
Speaker 5: Trudeau had been blamed for like sort of you know,
Speaker 5: post COVID inflation. Now they're gonna have a leadership change,
Speaker 5: but actually already even before there's a new leader, you know,
Speaker 5: like in Ontario, the Liberals are these poles. Certain Liberals
Speaker 5: are ahead of uh, the Conservative Party, so it's not
Speaker 5: going to be a blug bath. And in fact, if
Speaker 5: the Conservatives can't win in Ontario, they really can't win,
Speaker 5: they might get a minority government, but even though they're
Speaker 5: also pulling very valid in Quebec. So those are the
Speaker 5: two biggest provinces, y know, which together have like nearly
Speaker 5: half of the country's population. So basically I think, yeah,
Speaker 5: in a weird way, Trump has revived Canadian liberalism. I mean,
Speaker 5: I think we'll probably see that in a lot of
Speaker 5: other places as well. Like to the extent to which
Speaker 5: various right wing parties all over the world are associated
Speaker 5: with Trump, they will be very unpopular. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 5: I think that's like a cold comfort I feel to
Speaker 5: I buy American friends. But it is absolutely the case
Speaker 5: that we're seeing You're going to see a global reaction
Speaker 5: against us. And what I think maybe the longer term
Speaker 5: is something we're thinking about is like when you see
Speaker 5: in the Canadian elite, and especially even amongst our centrist
Speaker 5: and conservative types, this like idea like you know, we
Speaker 5: can't trust America the president of America. We can It's
Speaker 5: like professional wrestling kfabe but still like you having the
Speaker 5: President of America saying, you know, Knada is not a
Speaker 5: real country. We have to like Annax said, you know,
Speaker 5: like so you actually see people like very like people
Speaker 5: who had been in conservative governments in the past. Buy's
Speaker 5: never been say like, okay, we got to start. Can
Speaker 5: we get Canada in the European Union. Can we get
Speaker 5: Canada to get trade agreements in Asia and in Latin America?
Speaker 5: Can we work around the United States? Can we have
Speaker 5: like you know, like hedge oar bats, you know, diversify
Speaker 5: our assets, like like move beyond the United States. And
Speaker 5: I don't think that's in Canada alone. Like if you
Speaker 5: have like the co president Elon musk Is, you know,
Speaker 5: pushing like the far right in Germany, well guess what
Speaker 5: like in Germany, like you know, like the more brace
Speaker 5: stream people are gonna be thinking, like, you know, America,
Speaker 5: they saved us from naziuseam but where are they now?
Speaker 5: What is America now? It's not the America or anything good.
Speaker 2: It's get here. I hope you'll come back.
Speaker 5: Yes, of course. Always. You can't give me away. You
Speaker 5: can't give me away.
Speaker 1: Sky Perryman is the President of Democracy Forward.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to Fast Politics Sky.
Speaker 6: Hey did it always be here? What a world?
Speaker 1: Yeah, So talk to me about what is going on
Speaker 1: right now, what your organization is doing to hold this
Speaker 1: new whatever this is accountable.
Speaker 6: Well, look, first of all, I want to say, we
Speaker 6: know a lot many of Americans, including so many people
Speaker 6: on our team, are in a really hard time right
Speaker 6: now because this administration came in and just immediately started
Speaker 6: engaging in such behavior that is really I mean, hold
Speaker 6: living up, funding for community programs and essential services like
Speaker 6: meals on wheels, and disregarding the basic rights of people.
Speaker 6: So I just want to say, at the outset, we're
Speaker 6: going to talk about some things we're doing to make
Speaker 6: things better, but I don't want to undermine how the
Speaker 6: paint the fear that people are feeling at this point.
Speaker 6: But in the Court Democracy Forward, our organization, we have
Speaker 6: brought a number of cases against the administration's unlawful activity.
Speaker 6: I believe as of yesterday we had brought more cases
Speaker 6: than any other single organization or any ag But we
Speaker 6: are working so closely with so many organizations that are
Speaker 6: doing this work, and we had to mobilize and get
Speaker 6: into court last week to stop the freeze of essential
Speaker 6: services across the country where the administration just with the
Speaker 6: stroke of a pence, you know, tried to cut off
Speaker 6: everything for meals on wheels to head start to grant
Speaker 6: portals that were important for people's health care. I mean,
Speaker 6: it was really scary, and we were able to get
Speaker 6: into court overnight on behalf of some great clients, the
Speaker 6: American Public Health Association, the National Council of Nonprofits, SAGE,
Speaker 6: and Main Street Alliance. We were able to get in
Speaker 6: court and block that.
Speaker 1: Can you explain to me what the sort of legal
Speaker 1: plan is and how it works exactly?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 6: I mean, look, the legal plan is pretty simple. When
Speaker 6: Donald Trump violates the law and harms people and communities,
Speaker 6: he's going to have to answer in court for that behavior.
Speaker 6: We knew a lot of what he was going to
Speaker 6: do because it was all in a Project twenty twenty five, right,
Speaker 6: and we were ready to go. And that's why you
Speaker 6: see so many groups suing on birthright, citizenship other things.
Speaker 6: We were ready to go on those things. We also
Speaker 6: do that this administration wants to govern by chaos and confusion.
Speaker 6: That's one of the things they want to do. They
Speaker 6: want to throw people off kilter, and so we prepared
Speaker 6: for a long time to have the resources to be
Speaker 6: able to swiftly bring challenges. They were shocked that in
Speaker 6: the middle of the night we were able to get
Speaker 6: into court with great clients to stop what they were
Speaker 6: doing with the funding. You know, we're in court today
Speaker 6: because yesterday there were reports that the US Doge Service
Speaker 6: is going to enter the Department of Labor and try
Speaker 6: to misappropriate and take economic data across the country. I mean,
Speaker 6: just really terrible behavior. But we're able to mobilize and
Speaker 6: move very swiftly to get in court because of the
Speaker 6: preparation and because of the great warriors that are joining
Speaker 6: this work. So that the strategy is that as they
Speaker 6: act unlawfully, we're going to see them in court. And
Speaker 6: I did some accounting on the back of an envelope
Speaker 6: this morning, and there's not a single federal judge in
Speaker 6: this country that has ruled that they're doing anything lawfully.
Speaker 6: I mean, in every court challenge that's been brought where
Speaker 6: judges have considered these things and brought them to temporary orders,
Speaker 6: everyone including Reagan appointed judges, are saying that the administration
Speaker 6: is acting unlawfully. So we just have to do more
Speaker 6: lawsuits if they continue to violate the law and harm people.
Speaker 6: So here's my question for you.
Speaker 1: Elon Musk is basically doing whatever you want, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: he has a crew of people. They are getting into everything.
Speaker 1: What is the sort of is that illegal? And can
Speaker 1: it be stopped by the courts?
Speaker 6: It's completely unlawful. I do think it will be stopped
Speaker 6: by the courts. There's a hearing where I know we're
Speaker 6: recording this, but there's a hearing that's going to happen
Speaker 6: in a few minutes while we're on this podcast that's
Speaker 6: seeking to stop the misappropriation of data at Treasury. We
Speaker 6: have filed a suit this morning and are about to
Speaker 6: put a tro on file to stop them from doing this.
Speaker 6: At the Department of Labor, we've you know, already stopped
Speaker 6: the funding free So these are things that are completely
Speaker 6: on lane. They violate the Federal Privacy Act, they violate
Speaker 6: the protections against arbitrary and capricious and unlawful government activity,
Speaker 6: they violate a range of other standards, and I think
Speaker 6: you're going to see the courts issue orders to stop
Speaker 6: these things as soon as possible.
Speaker 1: What happens when Trump bold starts ignoring these orders when,
Speaker 1: for example, like birthright citizenship now is indefinitely his play
Speaker 1: on the fourteenth Amendment and definitely frozen. What happens when
Speaker 1: Trump World is like forget that these courts are I mean,
Speaker 1: what happens then?
Speaker 6: Well, you know a lot of people ask this question,
Speaker 6: and I think, you know, I want to kind of
Speaker 6: take it piece by piece. I mean, number one, we
Speaker 6: need to get the orders out there, right, we need
Speaker 6: to get at the court and have judges do what
Speaker 6: they have already been doing.
Speaker 2: No, you have to do this, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 6: And what we have seen in those cases last week,
Speaker 6: there was a concern that they weren't complying with the
Speaker 6: funding that the pause and the funding freeze order, and
Speaker 6: the judges already called that out. And we have seen
Speaker 6: them capitulate in some ways. So for instance, after a
Speaker 6: tro was entered and another funding case that the AG's brought,
Speaker 6: they issued guidance across the government. So part of it
Speaker 6: is making sure the courts are really putting lawyers through
Speaker 6: the paces.
Speaker 2: That's great.
Speaker 6: Yeah, lawyers gotthical obligation to follow court orders. And people
Speaker 6: don't want their bar license in jeopardy because their clients
Speaker 6: are not following court orders, and so I think that
Speaker 6: there are some places within our process.
Speaker 1: I want to just keep going for a second, because
Speaker 1: I think that's really important. A lot of lawyers got
Speaker 1: disbarred after Trump one point zero, So that is a
Speaker 1: real thing that can happen continue, and you don't.
Speaker 6: Want to have to show up to court and explain
Speaker 6: why your client is not operating consistently with the court orders,
Speaker 6: which is already starting to happen. So I will say that,
Speaker 6: like the lawyers on the side of people in democracy
Speaker 6: are lawyers, the state AG's lawyers, other organizations, We're going
Speaker 6: to push that if there are attempts to evade court orders.
Speaker 6: Now the issue then is what if there are attempts
Speaker 6: to evade court orders, and what if the courts keep
Speaker 6: ruling one way and the administration just does that sort
Speaker 6: of just operates completely outside those balance. I think that
Speaker 6: is a crisis that's you know, there's a number of
Speaker 6: crises in this country because of this administration and how
Speaker 6: they are operating. That is one crisis that could emerge,
Speaker 6: and our constitution provides checks to that. I mean, at
Speaker 6: some point, Congress and not just the Democrats in Congress,
Speaker 6: right at some point, Congress as a body has to
Speaker 6: step in. I think that this extreme behavior it threatens
Speaker 6: actually Congressism power, it threatens the Court's power. And so
Speaker 6: I do think you're going to see the checks and
Speaker 6: balances in our branches of government be an important counterweight.
Speaker 6: I mean, I will say that I do believe that
Speaker 6: they will be. And I think the main thing right now,
Speaker 6: in these early days is to for the administration to
Speaker 6: understand that if they do these things, they're going to
Speaker 6: have to go to court. I mean, they rescinded them
Speaker 6: last week because we went into court and got an
Speaker 6: order pausing it, and then there were concerns about their
Speaker 6: compliance with the order, right, and then they were send
Speaker 6: the memo and then now you know, the court is
Speaker 6: not fooled by that and has issued in.
Speaker 2: Order to protect people.
Speaker 6: But I just want to say, like, I think that
Speaker 6: it's that kind of retail level court advocacy that we're
Speaker 6: going to have to do right now to protect people
Speaker 6: in communities.
Speaker 1: Right, So talk to me about kind of what the
Speaker 1: strategy here is. There are so many things in my
Speaker 1: mind that seem like blatantly unconstitutional. The data stuff feels
Speaker 1: very high onless what else are you seeing?
Speaker 2: What else are you keeping track of and what else
Speaker 2: are you litigating?
Speaker 6: Again, Well, look, there are a number of attempts to
Speaker 6: just limit Americans' freedoms. And we sued, you know, last
Speaker 6: week on this DEI anti DEI orders that on behalf
Speaker 6: of the American Association of University Professors, on behalf of
Speaker 6: the National Council of Higher Education, Diversity officers, on behalf
Speaker 6: of restaurant workers, and the city of Baltimore. So everyone
Speaker 6: from the Ivory Tower to Main Street to wage workers
Speaker 6: are all in this case. And the case is not
Speaker 6: just about DEI. It's about our freedom of expression and
Speaker 6: our freedom of speech, and this presidence and this administration's
Speaker 6: attempt to unconstitutionally condition funding and other program benefits on
Speaker 6: particular viewpoints, and that is unconstitutional. And so you know
Speaker 6: that was right out of Project twenty twenty five. But
Speaker 6: we have those suits ready to go. We have sued
Speaker 6: on behalf of religious communities across the country to block
Speaker 6: ICE from entering churches rightah and schools right right, there's
Speaker 6: sensitive locations. And so I just so I think like
Speaker 6: some of it is just really making sure that where
Speaker 6: people's rights are violated under the Constitution that there are
Speaker 6: swift challenges and other organizations are doing that too. The
Speaker 6: other piece of the strategy is to make sure that
Speaker 6: where there have been policy advances, Okay, remember you know
Speaker 6: Medicare drug price negotiation, that's won't bring people's drug prices,
Speaker 6: hip a privacy, and reproductive privacy, those types of protections
Speaker 6: were being challenged by the Project twenty twenty five groups
Speaker 6: in the courts and them of Justice under the Biden
Speaker 6: administration was defending those and now you know, I don't
Speaker 6: know that Bondie's Department of Justice, you know, has not
Speaker 6: really shown that they will vigorously defend those policies. And
Speaker 6: so that's that's not headline grabbing work. But we're doing
Speaker 6: a lot to intervene in those cases to make sure
Speaker 6: that those policies are protected on behalf of Americans. So
Speaker 6: it's like, challenge the Project twenty twenty five blueprint, challenge
Speaker 6: other blatant violations of people's rights, right, defend the policies
Speaker 6: that need to be defended. And then the other part
Speaker 6: is what I call the kind of chaos factor. Right,
Speaker 6: this is administration that wants to throw people off guard.
Speaker 6: I don't understand that I don't understand why you become
Speaker 6: the president of the United States to go to war
Speaker 6: with your own people when you're saying shot on all that.
Speaker 2: But we know that playbook.
Speaker 6: It's an old playbook of theirs, and so we're ready
Speaker 6: now to be able to respond to the chaos. And
Speaker 6: that is what my team has been doing around the
Speaker 6: clock to make sure tros are filed quickly, you know,
Speaker 6: the funding freezes paused, that data is protected, and other
Speaker 6: organizations are doing that as well, and people can learn
Speaker 6: more about those efforts at a project that we launched
Speaker 6: called Democracy twenty twenty five dot org, where you can
Speaker 6: learn more. The other piece, Molly, is the civil service.
Speaker 6: Should we talk about that for a minute.
Speaker 1: Please, please please, because a lot of this is a
Speaker 1: war on nonpartisan government employees exactly.
Speaker 6: So you know, in the eighteen hundred, after there were
Speaker 6: concerns that the government was really not delivering for people,
Speaker 6: the country moved from what was called the spoil system
Speaker 6: to the civil service system that we have now, where
Speaker 6: the majority of people that are doing the work of
Speaker 6: the American people, delivering our mail, making sure our food
Speaker 6: is labeled appropriately, protecting our air and water quality, helping
Speaker 6: us at the airports, protecting our communities. The majority, the
Speaker 6: vast majority of those two point two million civil servants
Speaker 6: who live and work, by the way across the United
Speaker 6: States and every single state, their non part is and
Speaker 6: they work for Republican administrations, and they work for Democratic administrations,
Speaker 6: and they swear an oath to the Constitution, and that's
Speaker 6: the oath they have. Well, that type of a system
Speaker 6: is a real threat to people like Donald Trump who
Speaker 6: want to govern by, you know, governed by this narrow
Speaker 6: and rigid ideology, to create a country that's only for
Speaker 6: some and not for all of us. And so we
Speaker 6: have seen an outright assault on our nations public servants.
Speaker 6: We've seen a retribution agenda at the Department of Justice
Speaker 6: and in other agencies, but we've also just seen an
Speaker 6: outright assault on average Americans that have federal jobs, that
Speaker 6: are just doing their job and taking care of people.
Speaker 6: So they have already sought to reimpose Schedule F, which
Speaker 6: was one of our project twenty twenty five, you know,
Speaker 6: top that one of their product twenty twenty five Top
Speaker 6: P Priorities. We've filed two lawsuits on that. They have
Speaker 6: sent out a document purporting to try to buy out
Speaker 6: the federal workforce, but they're doing it in a way that,
Speaker 6: like Congress hasn't even appropriated funds. I mean, they're doing
Speaker 6: it in a way that it's not even clear if
Speaker 6: the buyout is actually something they would deliver on. It's
Speaker 6: you know, it's a scam, and so we filed yesterday,
Speaker 6: you know, to challenge that behavior. And then individual civil
Speaker 6: servants who are being placed on leads and who are
Speaker 6: being exited out of the government will have rights too,
Speaker 6: and some of those rights they'll they'll have to go
Speaker 6: to other forums. Sometimes they don't go straight into district court.
Speaker 6: Sometimes they can, but we are working to build as
Speaker 6: many legal defenses as possible and to help the people
Speaker 6: who have really helped our country. And your listeners can
Speaker 6: go to Civil Servicestrong dot org, which is one of
Speaker 6: our projects, civil servicestrong dot org and learn more about
Speaker 6: how they can support the civil service and if they
Speaker 6: are a civil servant, how they can get access to resources.
Speaker 2: That's great.
Speaker 1: Do you think these civil servants should write the CIA
Speaker 1: is being offered buyout, the FBI is being offered buyouts.
Speaker 2: Should people take these buyouts?
Speaker 6: You know, I am never going to advise anybody with
Speaker 6: their personal situation. But I think that you've seen a
Speaker 6: number of state attorneys, generals, the unions, a number of
Speaker 6: advocates and policymakers say, you know, proceed with caution. And
Speaker 6: then of course we have sued in court because we
Speaker 6: believe what they've done is unlawful, that it's very unclear,
Speaker 6: it's potentially misleading, misleading, and that there's not even funds
Speaker 6: appropriated for these purported buyouts. We have a lot of
Speaker 6: concern that if people take them, they could get rescinded
Speaker 6: in some way because there aren't funds. We have a
Speaker 6: lot of concerns about the vague language and the sort
Speaker 6: of roving the sort of roving positions people are taking,
Speaker 6: and then the fact that the agency really just did
Speaker 6: not even have legal authority to do this, to offer
Speaker 6: them anyway. Right, Yeah, So all of those are that's
Speaker 6: in court that you know. So what I hope is
Speaker 6: that if people are able, and I know everyone's in
Speaker 6: their own personal circumstance, but we're at this point of
Speaker 6: this country that we are going to get we're going
Speaker 6: to move forward only if we all commit to each
Speaker 6: other as a community, as a national community, that the
Speaker 6: best of this country, that the people of this country,
Speaker 6: that democracy in this country is not going to go
Speaker 6: down without a fight and without a lot of people
Speaker 6: doing everything they can in their own personal lives in
Speaker 6: this moment. And so you've got lawyers working around the clock,
Speaker 6: you have civil servants who are being disrespected that are
Speaker 6: still going into work to do their job to deliver
Speaker 6: for people. I was over on Capitol Hill today. You
Speaker 6: have members of Congress. I mean, we are all going
Speaker 6: to have to do our part, and so I hope
Speaker 6: that people will look at it through that lens and
Speaker 6: do what's right for them that also know that the
Speaker 6: American people just really appreciate our civil servants for sure.
Speaker 1: Tell me first what you think elected Democrats should be
Speaker 1: doing to support the really important federal employees and what's
Speaker 1: happening right now.
Speaker 6: Look, I think that they're really seeking to raise awareness
Speaker 6: about what's happening. I mean a lot of these federal employees,
Speaker 6: guess what, they live and work and serve people in
Speaker 6: Republican areas, in red areas across the country, Florida. I
Speaker 6: don't have my numbers in front of me. I think
Speaker 6: it's something like eighty thousand federal employees, maybe more than that, right,
Speaker 6: just you know in the deepest drided states. And so
Speaker 6: I think that part of this is making sure that
Speaker 6: those that are not supporting the civil service, whether they
Speaker 6: are in the administration or whether they are in Congress,
Speaker 6: are really held to account. And there are ways to
Speaker 6: do that, and I think you'll see members of Congress
Speaker 6: that support the civil service continuing to do that. And
Speaker 6: then a lot of it is supporting the legal challenges
Speaker 6: and then making this a salient issue. I mean, this
Speaker 6: should be an issue people that are putting our civil
Speaker 6: servants out of work, that are making it harder for
Speaker 6: Americans to get what they need. Those people should be
Speaker 6: put out of the job in two years, right, and
Speaker 6: I think in the midterms, and I think that elevating
Speaker 6: these issues in those ways is going to be.
Speaker 1: Really important, right. And I think that's a really good point.
Speaker 1: Talk to me about sort of any other legal challenges
Speaker 1: that you're doing right now.
Speaker 6: We sued DOSEE on the first day of the administration.
Speaker 6: There was a flurry of lawsuits against DOGE. We're trying
Speaker 6: to protect houses of worship from being turned into law
Speaker 6: enforcement facilities. Against ice. We have these three civil service lawsuits.
Speaker 6: We literally just filed before I got on the phone
Speaker 6: with you, a lawsuit that we're going to try to
Speaker 6: have heard today to prevent DOGE from coming into the
Speaker 6: Department of Labor and the Department of Labor from sort
Speaker 6: of seating very highly sensitive data on the entire American workforce,
Speaker 6: sensitive data about workers in the country, health data, you know,
Speaker 6: to sort of see that, so that will be heard.
Speaker 6: We have challenged a variety of the executive orders as
Speaker 6: violations of the First Amendment, and we are working you know,
Speaker 6: you're looking at these grant terminations, usaid, unpaid leave, all
Speaker 6: of those issues we were planning to litigate. So you'll
Speaker 6: see a lot more from us in the days ahead.
Speaker 2: Thank you, thank you, thank you scot.
Speaker 6: Well, thank you for having me on, and thank you
Speaker 6: Molly for everything that you're doing to make sure people
Speaker 6: are getting the message. And I think for so much,
Speaker 6: and you and I talk about this every time I
Speaker 6: come on, but just remember that there are far right
Speaker 6: movements in this country and the Trump administration that want
Speaker 6: people to feel like they have no power and that
Speaker 6: they have no reason to hope. And our work goes
Speaker 6: every day that we do have power and that we
Speaker 6: can find hope in each other and in utilizing that
Speaker 6: power for the future. And so that's what we're going
Speaker 6: to continue to do every day, and I'll come back
Speaker 6: and talk to you about it. Great, Thank you, great,
Speaker 6: Thanks so much.
Speaker 3: There no moth.
Speaker 4: Jesse Cannon Somali four or four Media, one of my
Speaker 4: favorite media outlets, has a really, really bad article about
Speaker 4: how Dose employees have been ordered to stop using slackball
Speaker 4: agency transitions to a record system not subject to FOYE,
Speaker 4: which really is one of those nightmare scenarios we kind
Speaker 4: of knew when we'd get into encrypted technologies would probably happen,
Speaker 4: but here we are in hell.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, look, I think that we shouldn't be so
Speaker 1: surprised that this was happening. None of our data is
Speaker 1: safe now we have all of these people who are
Speaker 1: in it, they or don't have the same kind of
Speaker 1: compliance they are, you know, doing a lot of stuff
Speaker 1: that is really it might be fine, it might not
Speaker 1: be fine, right, I Mean, that's that's going to be
Speaker 1: the big question here, and there are going to be
Speaker 1: all sorts of unforeseen consequences that we don't even know about.
Speaker 2: And I'm not surprised.
Speaker 7: You know.
Speaker 1: That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in
Speaker 1: every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday to hear the best
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Speaker 2: Thanks for listening.